The "people's coach" it has been called, but in misery's name, I ask,
must the whole public crowd into one coach? Yesterday, after I had
waited for a car the best part of the forenoon, it came crawling along
at snail-like pace, the horses fast asleep, and the driver gazing
vacantly into space, thoroughly exhausted in endeavors to wake them up.

I entered, and was thrust into one of two congealed rows of mortality,
which faced each other from opposite benches.

Then the people filled the passage; they crowded it to suffocation; they
piled on to the platforms in battalions; six wretches depended from the
hind brake; others were suspended from the top of the car, with hands
and feet thrust through the leathers, and two actually balanced
themselves around the driver's neck.

Fearful moans arose from the enormous mass of condensed humanity; people
panted for breath; they gasped, and rolled their eyes in horrible
frenzy, and still the conductor yelled fiercely, and with demoniac
leer:--

And thus his Voice rang through the stifling air,
"Plenty of room in front, move forward, there!"

It was raining; parasols leaked into my shoes, soaking water-proofs
embraced me, and monstrous brogans crushed my feet to chaos; then,
umbrellas punched my eyes, out, jabbed holes in my hat, and wrote
hieroglyphics all over my shirt bosom, while baskets of meat were
deposited in my lap, and the intruding tail of a codfish roughly slapped
my face a dozen times.